Peak seasons in the hospitality industry present both exciting opportunities and significant challenges for restaurant operators. The heightened demand during these times puts pressure on staff, systems, and overall operations.
A restaurant's peak season may be specific months like October to December or special occasions like Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, and Christmas.
In the Middle East and North Africa, the month of Ramadan is considered a peak month for restaurants.
Despite being an opportunity for restaurants to boost sales, the different pressures strain staff. From pressure to manage the rush and avoid mistakes to maintain a high level of service and guest expectations.
Restaurant peak seasons and peak hours
Anyone who has worked in the restaurant industry knows there are peak seasons, peak days, and peak hours.
Each of these peaks may vary from one country or region to another.
For example, in some Middle Eastern countries where the weekend is Friday and Saturday, peak days are Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.
Meanwhile, in the United Arab Emirates, the United States, and most of Europe, peak days are Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.
Various Servme customers report the busiest months in the UAE to begin in October through March or April.
Busy days aside, according to Copeland’s restaurant, Monday to be the “slowest day of the week” in the restaurant industry.
Hyatt Regency Dubai restaurant reservation manager Rejina Dangol confirms this. She explains that peak seasons for the hotel’s F&B concepts begin in September till the end of March.
April through July is considered an off-season, although it’s summertime.
To increase bookings during the off-season, the reservation and marketing teams at Hyatt Regency Dubai use Servme’s marketing features.
Further reading: Discover how Hyatt Regency Dubai added 88,000 guest profiles and uses Servme to boost retention
Top factors affecting seasonality in the restaurant industry
Many factors can influence guest visits to restaurants, ranging from weather conditions and the back-to-school season to cultural and religious holidays. Each of these can have a significant impact on guest behavior and overall foot traffic.
Certain holidays, such as Christmas or New Year's Eve, often bring a surge in diners, presenting a golden opportunity to boost your restaurant’s revenues through festive promotions and special events. However, other occasions may result in quieter periods, dining habits may shift, leading to fewer guests during specific times of the day or reduced demand for certain menu items.
Here are the top seasonal factors that affect the restaurant industry:
Changing seasons and weather conditions: People may often choose to dine out based on weather conditions. If it’s too cold or too hot, they won’t visit concepts with outdoor seating. You may find more people visiting concepts in summer because of the summer holidays.
Special occasions and events: Events like Halloween, Valentine’s Day, and Mother’s Day have a big impact on guests choosing to dine out. Many of these occasions involve gifts or a special day for a loved one or family member. Similarly, some restaurants create special dining events with limited-time menus, giving guests a limited opportunity to get an entirely new experience.
Holidays: Some holidays may have a positive impact on your reservations and walk-ins, while some may not. Whether it’s the summer holidays, Christmas holidays, or something else. Different holidays have different meanings and traditions.
Seasonal menus: These act as an opportunity to increase restaurant sales by enticing new and regular guests alike to your venues.
Local changes: These are specific annual occurrences that may or may not have direct impact on the number of guests. Some examples include the start, or end of the school or academic year, bank holidays, some school holidays, among others.
Economic conditions: It’s no surprise that economic changes can affect how many people visit your venue. The tighter the economy gets, along with constant increases in the prices of food and necessities, may prompt people to scale back on dining out. This depends on which country, or countries, you’re operating in.
Health trends: It seems like there’s always some new health fad or trend that we should be aware of. However, these trends may affect the number of people coming to your restaurant. Consider adding health information or low-calories food choices on your menu.
How to prepare your restaurant for peak seasons
Now, let’s get your restaurant ready for the rush, be it a peak season, special occasion or the weekend.
Tip #1: Identify your peak hours and peak seasons
Before you can get to work preparing for the peak season, you must first identify your
Peak season(s)
Peak days
Peak hours (if possible)
This will help you plan and determine your needs for those peaks. For example, knowing your peak days are Friday through Sunday allows you to increase staff on those days.
You may check out your competitors to learn more about peak days. However, make sure you take note of guest behavior in your venue.
For example, you may discover guests coming in between 12 pm and 3 pm during lunch breaks. Or you may get more takeout orders during those hours. So, you’ll need to prepare your kitchen staff to accommodate that rush.
Tip #2: Plan ahead
Once you’ve identified your peak hours, days, and seasons, it’s time to plan.
This involves planning for special occasions and events, like a birthday or corporate dinner, or a Halloween menu, or an upcoming venue launch.
For some occasions, you may need to plan months in advance. After all, restaurant planning and marketing are related and the success of one depends on the other.
Determine your needs, what’s missing, and be ready to take the rush head-on.
Further reading: 15 Reasons to Use Restaurant Event Management Software
Tip #3: Manage shifts based on peaks and sections
Part of preparing your restaurant for a peak season is making sure your team members are when and where they need to be.
If you manage several restaurant locations, determine which venues have the highest traffic or reservations, and allocate team members there.
If you have multiple sections in each venue, then make sure your team is in the section with the highest traffic.
For example, some restaurants have indoor seating and outdoor seating. Some sections may be busier or in higher demand than others.
Use Servme’s table management software to seat guests faster, manage and merge tables, and make the most of floor planning software.
Make sure your staff is where they need to be to respond quickly to guests and ensure a great experience.
Moreover, if you have venues in high-traffic locations or tend to be fully booked, make sure you bring in enough staff ahead of the rush. Be it a specific time during the day or several days in the week.
Many restaurants may hire part-time employees to meet their busy weekends.
Tip #4: Review your inventory
Having a full-house with insufficient inventory is a recipe for unsatisfied guests. Your guests don’t want to hear about all the dishes that aren’t available because you ran out.
Part of planning for a peak season or peak hours is making sure your inventory is stocked. This is even more important if you’re running a seasonal menu and guests are coming in to try it.
Use restaurant inventory management software to keep tabs on your inventory, shortages, and needs.
Tip #5: Prepare team members
Besides bringing in part-time employees on busy days and weekends, make sure your team is familiar with your venue’s peaks. Make sure they are trained to handle stressful hours and a flurry of guests.
If you’re using a restaurant management system, make sure all your staff are trained to use the software. This will ensure everyone avoids surprises when things get busy.
Tip #6: Invest in technology
To streamline operations, like table management, reservations, and waitlists, consider investing in software like Servme.
Not only will this help you save time and effort and manage guest experiences, but also you can collect guest feedback.
For example, Servme’s restaurant reservation management system helps F&B concepts connect with guests, get more online reservations, and manage marketing operations.
Further reading: 21 Restaurant Marketing Ideas to Drive Guest Spending in 2024
Tip #7: Turn tables faster
Part of managing a successful restaurant is clearing tables quickly but efficiently and ultimately managing table turnover.
Make sure you include the table turnover metric in your list of restaurant analytics you’re tracking for efficiency and success.
Tip #8: Get extra help (if needed)
It’s important to recognize when you need help and ask for it.
How often have restaurant managers tried to do everything themselves only to fall short? It’s not uncommon.
Make sure you ask for help, whether from your manager, or your team. Also make sure you are there for team members, guiding them, and helping them make it through busy hours and days.
Tip #9: Learn from previous efforts
Accept that you may not get everything right the first time. Especially if you’re new to the restaurant business or you just opened a new venue during a peak season.
While preparation is essential either way, you should learn from your mistakes to better plan in the future.
Tip #10: Give yourself and your team time
We’ve all gone through last-minute preparations for a weekend rush, special event, or busy day. Make sure you review data about guest behavior so you can give yourself and your team time to prepare and plan.
While last-minute prep is inevitable, planning helps you overcome mistakes and stress.
Tip #11: Reduce no-shows with deposits and prepayments
You’ve planned everything and prepped your front-of-house and back-of-house teams, and everything is in order. Except for your guests.
You have a 10-person group coming in at 8 pm and it’s already 8:30 pm and none of them are there yet. You’re likely up against a case of no-show guests.
You can reduce no-show guests and last-minute cancellations by asking for deposits and reservation or cancellation fees.
If you offer set menus, you can also ask for prepayments or pre-authorized payments. In this case, guests pay the full amount upfront through your reservation widget.
Further reading: How to Create a Restaurant No-Show Policy [Templates Included]
Tip #12: Collect guest data to personalize experiences during the rush
It’s easy to get lost and forget about guests when it gets busy. But using a restaurant CRM system, you can collect guest information, build guest profiles, and offer a tailored dining experience even when it’s busy.
Your guests will remember it and come back for more.
Tip #13: Promote your events
Part of managing your restaurant’s peak season is to market upcoming special events, seasonal menus, and so on.
If you’re using Servme, you can do that using the Servme reservation widget. It not only helps you collect and manage reservations but also collects reservation fees, and guest information for your CRM, lets you promote special events and more.
Tip #14: Use marketing automation
As mentioned, an important part of planning is your marketing strategy and efforts. Speed up those marketing efforts by using restaurant marketing automation.
These marketing tools include email and SMS marketing in platforms like Servme, along with others you can use to improve your marketing efforts.
Use personalization and triggers to send email or SMS campaigns to guests who visited your restaurant in the last 90 days. Or who didn’t visit your restaurant for 90 days and you want to welcome them back. You can also automate email and SMS for guests’ birthdays and anniversaries.
Tip #15: Choose the best communication method
Which communication platform do your guests prefer? Is it email? SMS? WhatsApp?
Ask your guests and use that platform to communicate with them.
If you’re using Servme, you can use and automate messages across all 3 platforms from your Servme dashboard.
Servme customers also get access to a library of templates for every occasion. You can use the templates to customize your messages to your brand voice, colors, and more.
Further reading: The Starter’s Guide to Using WhatsApp Business for Restaurants
Tip #16: Analyze data for future improvements
The high season in the food-and-beverage industry spans a few months. Each year depends on what you have learnt in the previous season so you can make improvements.
Measuring various restaurant metrics and analytics can help you identify areas of improvement.
For example, measuring analytics such as Revenue Per Available Seat Hour, or RevPASH, and average check per table, can help you forecast your weekly and monthly revenue. They can also help you uncover ways to improve those metrics to increase your restaurant revenues.
If you’re using Servme, you can generate these reports, or have your dedicated account manager create customized reports at the end of each month and quarter.
Part of measure analytics should be reviewing your booking sources. These are the top platforms that drive reservations to your restaurant.
If you’re using Servme, you can list your restaurant and get reservations from Facebook and Instagram, Reserve with Google, Tripadvisor, Zomato, among others.
Wrapping it up
Preparing for the high season shouldn’t be a hassle or a headache. It’s an opportunity to delight, engage, and build long-term relationships with your guests.
If you want to do all that and streamline operations, create marketing campaigns across email, SMS, and WhatsApp, and drive guest retention, we invite you to try Servme.
Servme is a reservation, table, and waitlist management system that helps restaurants and F&B groups drive retention, engagement, and secure in-advance revenue. We also help you reduce no-shows and deliver memorable dining experiences that keep guests coming back.
Get in touch with Servme today and discover how to prepare for the high season, while saving time and money on daily operations.
Nada Sobhi
Marketing
